


You get what you settle for

by abbner



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst and Humor, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, On the Run, Road Trips, Slow Burn, thelma and louise shenanigans
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-22 16:33:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30041541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abbner/pseuds/abbner
Summary: “I would rather,” he says, grinding his teeth hard enough to crack, “be trapped in this car with literally anyone else.”Potter’s white knuckles tighten on the steering wheel. He does not take his eyes off the road. “Fucking likewise,” he mutters.An unwelcome visitor arrives on the day of Draco’s execution with a brilliant escape plan. Naturally, it goes terribly wrong. Which is how Draco and Harry find themselves on the run, wanted for murder, with nothing but thirty quid, a temperamental Ford Anglia, and each other to rely on.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 1
Kudos: 17





	You get what you settle for

Draco stares at the ceiling of the cell and counts the slimy grey tiles for the hundredth time, or perhaps the hundred and first. He’s been stuck in his dungeon for so long he’s lost count. Though he has no way of knowing what day it is, or even whether it’s day or night, he’s sure it’s been months at least since he was sentenced to die. Possibly years. It feels like it’s been an eternity.

He’s not entirely sure what’s taking so long. His father’s execution took place barely a minute after he was found guilty. He knows this well, because the scene insists on playing itself out in his head roughly every ten minutes. He knows it by heart now - a cold chamber in the basement of the ministry, his father, pale, tear streaked and in chains, surrounded by dementors, a verdict cast down from on high, shouts from the crowd, hands pulling him away, grey eyes meeting his own, a high scream, a flash of silver, a gush of red. They’d killed him like a muggle. 

The bright side to all this is that he won’t have to endure this memory or the dingy dungeon cell for much longer. He’ll meet a similar fate to his father before too long, though surely not exactly the same. Speculating how he will be executed has become another favorite pastime since his sentencing, second only to counting the ceiling tiles. The ministry is very into poetic justice these days, which is lucky for Draco as they’ve decided to keep him prisoner at Hogwarts rather than Azkaban. The site of his greatest crime will also be the site of his execution, which he’s sure will be public and bear striking resemblance to the crime for which he’s been sentenced to die - the murder of Albus Dumbledore.

That he didn’t technically commit said murder is of little importance to anyone involved. The ministry has adopted a more proactive approach towards crime in recent months, and become quite creative when deciding what exactly constitutes crime at all. This was a direct reaction to the previous administration’s more tolerant and forgiving nature, which itself was a reaction against the previous _previous_ administration, which was run entirely by Death Eaters.

The current regime took over after about three years of a peace that had become so strained that it hardly resembled peace at all. Immediately after the war ended the ministry had appointed a slew of members of the Order of the Phoenix, headed by Kingsley Shacklebolt and handpicked by Harry Potter himself, or so the rumors say. This had gone very well for approximately one week, at which point it became apparent that repairing a country ravaged by years of war would take quite a bit more than just putting good-hearted people in the right offices. The Death Eaters had done a fine job of mucking things up on their way out, though it’s likely that even they didn’t realize just how effective this tactic would be at quashing Potter and his friends once and for all.

The public had been quite patient with the new administration. For a while. This had been as good a period as Draco had experienced in the last five years. Sure, his fortune had disappeared, and none of his surviving friends would speak to him, and he’d been subject to the most awful humiliation of all time when Potter showed up at his trial going on about _poor, stupid Draco who just hadn’t understood what he was getting into when he joined a genocidal death cult at fifteen, the soft-brained idiot._ But at least the prospect of immediate death wasn’t looming over him and his family at all times, which had to count for something. And they hadn’t taken the manor, at least. He’d been content to lay low for a few years, perhaps travel abroad, and make his return to wizarding England when memories of the war and his role in it were a bit more distant.

And then things took a turn. Draco can’t recall exactly how it started, probably because it didn’t ever really start. It simmered from the very moment Voldemort was struck down, through three years of gridlock, sabotage, delayed and insufficient reform, and at times simple ministerial incompetence, until finally it came to a boil. It seemed like every witch and wizard in Britain had some irreconcilable grievance against the ministry. The economy was worse than it was during the war, muggle-born restrictions weren’t lifted fast enough, businesses were being looted every other day. But there was one outrage above all others that everyone could agree on - Death Eaters walking free. 

From the chaos a new faction had emerged, which was actually an old faction that had quite successfully rebranded itself for the new era. Led by one Dolores Jane Umbridge, they promised law and order, a return to normalcy that the radical Shacklebolt regime had no interest in or ability to give. Their popularity had skyrocketed seemingly overnight, and in no time they were in power.

Old networks that worked well together during the Death Eater regime worked just as well now that everything was back to normal. The ministry started functioning again, at higher levels of efficiency than ever before. There were those who disapproved of the new regime, but it didn’t much matter. The voices decrying the new nationwide surveillance wards or the restrictions on international travel or the return of the Muggle-Born registration commission were overshadowed by the excitement of a new Undesirable Number One being captured and brought to justice each week. After years of waiting people wanted blood. And at some point, though again he couldn’t tell you exactly when, speaking out became a crime itself.

Draco had been taken into custody before he’d even had the chance to think about escaping. He’d been trotted out for his father’s trial (if you could call it that) and execution (if you could call it that), and his own trial, but other than that he’s been stuck in one cell or another for the better part of a year. At first it wasn’t so bad, they brought him the newspaper and allowed his mother to visit him after she was cleared of all charges. Her good fortune had actually convinced him that he’d get out easily as well, an idea so stupid that he can’t help but laugh at when he looks back on it. His mother had become well known as Potter’s protector, a brave, powerful woman who had stood up to the Dark Lord himself, without whom the world could never have been saved from the clutches of the murderous cult of which she was a long-time member. She’d unintentionally amassed a bit of a fan base, and she also hadn’t killed Albus Dumbledore. 

Draco had neither of those things going for him. He’d gotten the feeling that things might not go well for him when his father was murdered in front of his eyes immediately following his sham trial, but hearing the words “sentenced to die” spoken down at him just a few weeks later had still come as a severe shock to his system. 

A shock from which he’s now fully recovered. He’d been pleasantly surprised at how quickly the sheer horror he felt at every waking hour gave way to numbness, save for an ever present, dull nausea. But that’s easily ignored when there are so many tiles to count.

His counting is interrupted by the dungeon door rattling, and not just the tiny slot that they shove stale bread through twice a day. Someone is trying to get in.

This is it. This must be it. They’re coming to take him away. To kill him. His life is about to end.

He closes his eyes. Takes a deep breath. Fills his lungs with cold, damp air, exhales. Steels himself. Opens his eyes.

He’s ready to die. He’s been ready for months, years really. It’s not like he’ll be missing out on much, being dead. Being alive hasn’t done much for him recently. The numbness has made his impending doom much easier to face. But even still, his knees shake as he sits up straight to face the cell door.

Muffled voices come from outside it. Someone is shouting. Perhaps there’s a crowd gathered outside, eager for a show. 

Well, they’re about to be disappointed, he decides. If they want him to plead, bargain, scream, fight like some of the others had, then he’ll give them the exact opposite. He’ll face whoever comes through that door with proud, stoic silence, his head held high, without so much as a glance back. His father would be proud. It’s surely the kind of death he would have chosen for himself, if he’d been given a bit more time to prepare. 

The voices die down and the door starts rattling again. Finally, it bursts open, filling the cell with blinding light. Draco throws up a hand to cover his eyes, which haven’t been exposed to more than weak, clammy torchlight in weeks.

A figure rushes into the cell and shuts the door with a bang. Draco lowers his arm and opens his eyes. He immediately wishes he hadn’t.

Harry Potter stands before him. The door’s echo fills the cold distance between them.

Draco stares at him. He says nothing. His mind is blank.

Potter stares back. He says nothing. He blinks a few times. His brow furrows. He opens his mouth and closes it, pressing his lips together in a thin line. 

Draco’s eyes narrow.

Potter takes a deep breath. “Uh,” he says, stupidly. “Hi.”

Draco does not respond right away. He lifts his chin to stare down his long nose at Potter, as if it can put more distance between them than the tiny dungeon cell can offer. He does not rise off the bed. 

“Why,” he asks after a long moment, his voice low and scratchy from disuse, “are you here?”

He realizes that Potter is breathing deeply, almost as if he’s been running. “I came to see you,” says, harried.

Draco’s scowl deepens. Something familiar simmers in his stomach. Something he hasn’t felt in a long time. _“Why,”_ he repeats, slowly, “did you come see me?”

“I-” Potter frowns, as if he hadn’t expected him to ask the most obvious question imaginable. “You didn’t kill Dumbledore.”

Draco blinks. It’s fury, he realizes, the feeling that’s building in him. Quite a strange sensation after months of nothing but dull nausea. “I know,” he says.

“Right. Well,” Potter says, running a hand through his untidy hair. He takes a few steps closer and lowers his voice. “Listen there’s not much time, they’ll be here in a few minutes to take you to the astronomy tower.”

Draco’s stomach drops. The nausea returns. He finds it a bit difficult to breathe. “It’s- it’s today then?”

Potter’s eyes widen. “Wha- did they- did no one tell you?”

“No,” he says. His vision tunnels, he feels as though he’s standing outside of his body rather than existing within it. _Pull yourself together,_ he commands himself, in a voice that sounds much like his father’s. 

“I- I’m sorry,” Potter stammers, a million miles away. “The ministry really aren’t happy with me, it was really difficult to even get here to see you. I reckon they’re going to lock me up soon, too.”

There’s something about the sound of his voice, something so singularly irritating, so unbelievably boorish, so _uniquely Potter_ that shakes him from his stupor. The gall of him, showing up to complain about how difficult his life is on the day of _Draco's execution_. He feels his face contorting of its own accord into the most withering glare he's capable of.

“I tried to get your sentence revoked,” Potter continues, unperturbed, “but all I could do was stall for a few days. I couldn’t get a hold of a single member of the Wizengamot, I’m not even sure who’s on it anymore, or if anyone is. It’s all so fucked, I did everything I could but there was nothing, nothing…” he trails off, shaking his head, looking at Draco with something like desperation.

Draco’s blood begins to boil _._ “So that’s why you came, is it?” he says, pure contempt dripping off his tongue. “To soothe your troubled conscience, to make sure I go to my death knowing you did _everything_ you could?”

“No,” Potter says, sounding slightly affronted. “I- um-” he digs around in his jacket pocket for a moment before pulling out something very familiar. “I came to bring you this.”

Draco stares at the wand clutched in Potter’s outstretched hand. _His_ wand. Hawthorne and unicorn hair. He thought he would never see it again, let alone touch it, use it, but here it is, being offered to him. He swears he can feel it from a few feet away, like it’s calling for him. 

He does not reach for it. He lifts his eyes to Potter’s. “Why?”

Potter’s brow scrunches. “What do you mean why?”

“Why did you bring it?”

“To give it back to you,” Potter says as if it should be obvious. He brandishes the wand again. “Here, take it.”

Draco does not take it. He rolls his eyes. “Wow, thanks so much Potter, I’ll really enjoy using this for the next fifteen minutes.”

The look on Potter’s face is priceless. “Do you _ever_ stop being such a _prat?”_

The answer to that question is yes, Draco thinks, he actually hasn’t been a prat for a long while now. He stopped being one the moment his father was killed in front of him, and started up again roughly ten seconds after Potter entered his cell. It feels good to be back.

“That’s not why I brought it,” Potter continues without waiting for an answer. “Look, at the end of this hallway there’s a portrait of a man in an eye patch brewing lucky potion, if you poke his good eye it’ll swing open revealing a staircase-”

“That’s very interesting,” Draco deadpans. “Your staircase knowledge is very impressive Potter, and you are so good and brilliant, is that what you want me to say?”

“I am telling you so that you can escape,” Potter hisses. “I can’t believe I have to spell it out for you, or were you always this thick?”

Draco blinks at him. “So I can escape?”

 _“Keep your voice down!”_ Potter whisper-yells. “Yes, that’s what I’ve been trying to say. I’ll distract the guard, or you can stun him, actually you should stun me too, I bet you want to do that anyway. Then you take those stairs, and it lets out in an abandoned classroom with a broken window, I’ve left a broom there so you can-”

“I’m not escaping,” Draco says.

“You’re- what?” Potter shakes his head. “No I’ve just told you, there’s a secret passage at the end of the hall-”

“No,” he says. “I’m not escaping.”

“But- no- Malfoy, I am helping you escape.” It’s as if he thinks saying it over and over again will help achieve his desired outcome.

“No, you’re not,” Draco says matter-of-factly. “I’m staying right here.”

“But- _why?”_

“Because I don’t want to go,” he says simply.

“You don’t want to escape,” Potter says, incredulous.

“Glad you finally got there.”

“I don’t understand,” Potter says, stating the obvious. “You want to die then?”

“Not particularly.” Draco is having more fun than he has in years.

“Well,” Potter scoffs, “I hate to be the one to tell you this but you are going to die very soon if you don’t escape now.”

“Really?” Draco gasps, widening his eyes dramatically. “Merlin, I had no idea! I thought they were going to give me a very stern talking to and send me on my way.”

“I can’t believe this,” Potter says, running a hand through his already disheveled hair. “I really can’t. You’re choosing to go to your death rather than accept help from me, is that it?”

Draco prickles. “Yes that’s right Potter, my death, like absolutely everything else in the world, is all about you.”

Potter rolls his eyes. “Fine, what is it then?”

“I’ve already told you,” Draco says. “I _don’t want to escape._ And I don’t have to justify anything to you.”

“But you’re going to die!” Potter exclaims, looking rather crazed.

It hits Draco then that Potter is genuinely upset, a very strange realization that takes him off guard. “Why do you care?” he asks.

Potter pauses a moment before answering. “You didn’t turn me over to Voldemort,” he says. “At the manor, when they caught me. You knew it was me and you lied.”

“Right. Best decision of my life,” Draco says, sarcasm dripping off his voice. “And you saved me from the fire, so we’re even.”

“It’s not about getting even,” Potter says, sounding increasingly annoyed. “You don’t deserve to die.”

Draco laughs. “Quite a few people disagree with you there.”

“Who cares?” Potter cries, throwing his hands up. “You want to die because your reputation is ruined?”

“For the love of- you really are as dumb as you look.”

“Then what is it?”

“For the one millionth time. I just. Don’t. Want. To escape.”

“You just don’t want to?”

“No.” He hasn’t wanted anything in months, now that he thinks of it. Until right now, that is. Right now he wants to piss Potter off as much as possible.

“You don’t- what, you don’t _feel like it?”_

“I really don’t.”

“You’ve cracked.”

“I haven’t,” Draco says. “But you have if you think that my last act on this earth is going to be to feed your twisted hero complex.”

Potter crosses his arms, a shadow crossing his face. “That’s _not_ what this is.”

“Of course it is,” Draco says, leaning back against the wall. “Don’t pretend it’s not.”

“I’m not pretending-”

“Oh please,” Draco says, “save it for someone who won’t be dead in an hour. You might be able to fool everyone else into thinking you’re some kind of saint, but you and I both know that you only do it to get off.”

 _“Get off?”_ Potter sputters, his voice getting louder, “What is _wrong with you?”_

“Struck a nerve, have I? It’s because I’m right isn’t it?” Potter is shaking now, Draco feels a long forgotten rush as he continues. “You go around all high and mighty but the truth is you only care about people when you can get some glory out of it. Well, sorry, but you’re going to have to get your fix from someone else today because I’m not interested.”

Potter shakes his head. “Even if that were true, what do you care? Why does it matter to you how I feel? I’m offering you your life, just, I don’t know, take advantage of me and get out of here.”

Draco scoffs. “As if it’s that easy.”

“It is that easy - _I’ve made it_ that easy. I literally just told you.”

“Yeah, I heard, I fly out of here, and then what?” Draco spits. “Where could I _possibly_ go from there? Not home, obviously, I’d be back here thirty seconds after setting foot on the manor grounds. All my friends are dead or in prison or so far underground that they wouldn’t risk coming within a hundred miles of me.”

“You’d have to leave the country,” Potter says.

“That is a _brilliant_ conclusion, Potter, but _how the fuck_ am I supposed to get out? Last I heard there was no getting in or out without the Ministry knowing.”

Potter lowers his voice again. “There’s a way. I’ve heard rumors about a few people - your people, not mine - who are operating east of here, outside Aberdeen. Smuggling people out. You could get there in a few hours.”

“My people,” Draco says with as scathing a look as he can muster. “Great, thanks. Good thing they let me keep my Rolodex full of _my people_ when they arrested me for murder, otherwise I’d have to knock on every door in Scotland-”

“There’s an address written on the broom, arsehole.” Potter takes a quick, deep breath. “Look I’m not saying it’ll be easy but you can figure it out. You always figure out a way to get what you want.”

“Actually, you’re thinking of you,” Draco says, looking away. “It wouldn’t matter, I wouldn’t even make it past Inverness.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do. And besides, you know,” Draco down further, folds his arms tight across his chest. “I _am_ guilty.”

“What? No. You’re not,” Potter insists. “You didn’t kill Dumbledore.”

“I didn’t cast the spell,” he says. He can feel the heat creeping up his neck, he hadn’t meant to get into this with Potter but it’s too late now. “But he died because of me, so...”

“No, he didn’t,” Potter says adamantly. “He was going to die anyway, he and Snape had an agreement.”

“Yeah. Right. But if he’d had longer-” he cuts off, horrors from his seventh year flashing in his mind. First years screaming, blood spattered on the cobblestone, Gryffindors writhing on the ground under the Carrows’ cruciatus curse, under his own. He shakes his head and pulls his knees to his chest, eyes fixed determinedly on the stone wall. He’s unable to continue or to look anywhere in Potter’s vicinity.

Potter is silent for a moment. “It all would have happened without you,” he says quietly. “He was poisoned, he was dying that night regardless. And besides, our side couldn’t have held Hogwarts for much longer even with him. We were so weak, we still are, which is why…”

Draco glances back at Potter, blinking away the wetness in his eyes. “Do you feel responsible for what’s going to happen to me? Is that it?”

Potter opens his mouth and shuts it. He takes a deep breath. “Yeah. I do,” he says, his voice rather scratchy. “It’s all wrong. I never wanted any of this.”

It’s quite funny, Draco decides. Not long ago he’d been in the exact same situation as Potter. Fancied himself a hero, when all he’d done was usher in a host of horrors he’d never intended. He would find it much funnier, he thinks, were he not about to be put to death because of it. It’s still pretty funny, but the circumstances certainly put a damper on it. 

“Well it’s what you got,” he says. “And this is what I got. And now we have to live with it. Or die with it, I suppose,” he adds.

Potter shakes his head in disbelief. “I just can’t believe you’re giving up like this.” There’s a twinge to his voice that Draco’s never heard before, but that can’t be anything other than utter devastation. It’s rather startling, and becomes more so when Potter looks away, blinking quickly.

Draco frowns, ignores it as best he can. “Believe it or don’t. You’ll watch it happen soon enough.” He pauses. “The astronomy tower, huh?”

Potter grimaces, still looking at the wall. “It’s... it’s terrible”

“Yeah,” Draco says. “But at least it’s not _my people_ right?”

Potter looks at him with such ferocity that he almost regrets his words. “Yeah. You _are_ right about that.”

Draco knows this, but he’ll go to his grave without allowing Potter the satisfaction of knowing that he knows this. He rolls his eyes instead. “Whatever, Potter. I’m not going to waste my last moments arguing with you.”

Potter’s face twists again, just for a moment, before he looks away again. They stay like that for a long moment, Potter standing at the door, looking at the wall, Draco on the bed, hugging his knees, head in his arms. In the stillness he finds it impossible to avoid thinking about his impending doom any longer. 

He’s going to die in a matter of minutes. And then he will be dead. Forever. Potter will still be alive but Draco will be dead.

The thought is incomprehensible. It makes his head hurt. His mouth feels dry. His vision begins to black out around the edges.

This is all Potter’s fault, he realizes. He was perfectly fine feeling nothing at all, until Potter barged through his cell door and triggered Draco’s ire in the uniquely Potter way that he always does. And now a dam has broken. He much preferred arguing with Potter to whatever this is.

“Fuck off,” he spits, a bit louder than he intended. Potter jumps. “Can you even allow me a moment’s peace before I’m sent to my death, or must you insist on bothering me right up until the end?”

Potter looks confused. “I wasn’t even saying anything.”

“Yeah well you’re irritating me just by being here," Draco says without looking at him, "but I’m sure there’s nothing I can say to get you to go away. I bet you’ll even follow me up to the astronomy tower, bet you just can’t resist it.”

Potter’s brow furrows, but then his eyes widen almost imperceptibly. “Do you… can I come?”

Draco rolls his eyes as infuriating relief washes over him. “Fine. Whatever,” he says, praying that his voice betrays only irritation.

“Okay then, yeah, I’m coming,” Potter says, his eyes questioning as if he’s unsure of himself. He’s silent for another moment. “You know, I died once.”

“So I’ve heard,” Draco says. “Congratulations, Potter, you’ve beaten me at literally everything right up to kicking the bucket.”

‘Piss off,” Potter says, but there’s no venom to it. “It’s, uh, it’s not painful. Dying, that is.”

Draco glares up at him but says nothing.

Potter’s cheeks flush. He looks away before he continues. “It’s quicker and easier than falling asleep.”

Draco opens his mouth to say something but finds that, for once in his life, words escape him. His throat feels unnaturally tight. 

He’s spared from having to respond when the door opens with a bang, startling both of them. An auror who Draco vaguely recognizes but who’s name he neither remembers nor cares about comes through it. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Potter slip the hawthorne wand back into his pocket.

The auror doesn’t notice. “It’s time,” he says. “On your feet, Malfoy.”

Draco swallows, his mouth quite dry. His stomach churns. He slowly uncurls himself and lowers his shaking legs to the ground, willing them to bear his weight without collapsing.

Potter is several shades paler than usual and looks about as unsteady as Draco feels. But his voice is level when he speaks. “I’m coming,” he says to the auror simply.

The auror gives him a beleaguered look. “I do not think that is wise, Mr. Potter,” he says, his heart clearly not in it.

“I don’t care,” Potter insists. “I was there the night Dumbledore was murdered. By _someone else,_ not that you care. Shouldn’t I be there for this?”

The auror looks as exasperated by Potter’s impudence as Draco would be under any other circumstances. “I don’t have time for this again,” he mutters, exhausted.

Potter nods. “Great,” he says. “Lead the way.”

He shakes his head. “The Death Eater leads the way,” he says, grabbing Draco by the collar and shoving him out the door. “You walk behind him.”

Potter glares at the auror. Draco rolls his eyes. “Let’s just fucking go,” he mutters.

They set off in silence, Draco trudging ahead, Potter barely a step behind him and the auror in the back, his wand drawn. Draco’s heart thuds in his ears. He focuses on putting one foot in front of the other, step by step, his brain zeroing in on the rhythmic _tap, tap, tap_ of his shoes on the stone floor to keep from blacking out.

He’s acutely aware of eyes on him. Potter quickens his pace to walk next to Draco, ignoring the auror’s grumbling, and seems unable to stop himself from turning to gawk at him every five seconds. He leans in close, so close that their arms brush against each other. Draco is suddenly struck with the wild urge to grab his hand.

 _Pathetic,_ says the voice in the back of his mind.

A flash of silver. A gush of red.

“Malfoy,” Potter hisses. “We can still-”

“Shut up,” he says through gritted teeth. “Please just shut up.”

Potter obliges. This is good, Draco tells himself. _Do not take his hand,_ Draco tells himself. _Don’t even look his way._

Potter continues shooting him furtive glances until the turn into the grand staircase. His eyes finally tear away from Draco to gape up at the high walls, which, to be fair, are utterly unrecognizable. 

“What the-” Potter mutters.

Even now Draco finds himself taken aback by the dramatic change in castle decor. It’s as if he’s been sent back in time to his fifth year. The portraits have been removed from the castle walls, replaced with hundreds and hundreds of flyers, roughly half of them bearing a portrait of a very familiar, very toad-like woman. _Minister of Magic, Dolores Jane Umbridge,_ reads the curly script beneath her simpering face.

The other half are crammed full of text and vary wildly. There are dozens at least.

> _By order of the Ministry of Magic, all Muggle-born students must report to the Muggle-born wing by 7PM curfew. Noncompliance is punishable by immediate expulsion._

> _By order of the Ministry of Magic, all Muggle-born witches and wizards must register themselves with the Muggle-Born Registration Commission. Noncompliance is punishable by a minimum ten years in Azkaban._

> _By order of the Ministry of Magic, all social clubs are disbanded until further notice. Noncompliance is punishable by a minimum five years in Azkaban. Any affiliation with the following terrorist organizations is punishable by a minimum twenty-five years in Azkaban._
> 
> _Death Eaters_
> 
> _Dumbledore’s Army_
> 
> _The Order of the Phoenix_

He glances at Potter and sees his face contorted in fury. Draco forces himself to scoff. “Not what you had in mind when you killed you know who?”

“You think this is funny?” Potter asks without looking at him, his voice cold.

“Hilarious,” Draco says, though he’s never wanted to laugh less in his life. Potter gives him a strange look.

They turn into a corridor and continue up the familiar spiral staircase. Draco remembers vividly climbing these stairs five years ago on that fateful night, running as quickly and quietly as he could, simultaneously relieved and utterly horrified at the freedom he’d find at the top of the staircase once he completed his final task. Funnily enough he has a similar feeling now.

 _Quicker and easier than falling asleep_ , Potter said. But he’s always had terrible trouble falling asleep.

They climb higher and higher, his heart thudding louder with each step. Surely Potter can hear it, though he dare not look to him for his reaction.

Finally they reach the top. The cold air sends a shiver through him as he steps out onto the astronomy tower landing, or perhaps it’s panic setting in. A rough hand pushes him forward onto the landing, towards the edge where the parapets have been removed. He supposes this is just in case the killing curse doesn’t blow him back hard enough like it did with Dumbledore, so Potter and the auror don’t have to hurl his lifeless body over the wall to send him falling dramatically to the ground. The thought is oddly hilarious, he finds himself holding back a giddy laugh.

His hands are unbound and he’s shoved toward the edge, the auror following close behind him. Potter hangs back, his eyes on Draco from over the auror’s shoulder. 

Draco’s head swims as he crosses the tower; he feels rather like he’s in a dream. Probably because he’s visited this tower so many times in his nightmares. But always in darkness, with nothing but void to swallow up the old man when he’s thrown beyond the ledge.

Today he can see everything in perfect clarity. The astronomy tower must have the best view in the castle, though he’s never noticed it before. He can see over the entire forbidden forest, or most of it, at least, endless trees for miles, and snowy mountains beyond. The black lake is blue and clear, almost crystalline the way the setting sun sparkles on it.

There’s a large crowd gathered below, but they’re too far away to hear. All he hears are birds. They must have made a nest somewhere in the tower. 

He likes the sound of birds. He listened to them often during those months he was trapped in the manor. The sound reminded him that there was life out there untouched by Voldemort. So close he could grasp it, if he really wanted to. But he could never quite bring himself...

“Any last words?” the auror grunts from somewhere behind him.

He shakes his head. For once he doesn’t feel any need to fill the air. All he needs is to focus on the sound of birds. They remind him of something he knew back then, something he still knows, deep down.

 _I don’t want to die._ He’d forgotten this, somehow, but he remembers now.

_I don’t want to die._

He turns around. His eyes meet Potter’s like a reflex. Have they always been so green? So bright?

They go impossibly brighter for a split second. Potter nods.

_“Avada-”_

“Expelliarmus.”

A flash of red. A terrible scream.

Sheer horror washes over Potter's face. His arm is outstretched, his white-knuckled hand clutching two wands. 

Draco tears his eyes from Potter’s in time to see the auror fly past him, off the ledge and out of sight. 

His screams fade away to nothing, leaving him alone with Potter and the sound of birds.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading a new incomplete drarry longfic in the year 2021! this is heavily inspired by thelma and louise, future chapters will be much more roadtrippy. also fuck terfs always! i don't own HP but if I did I sure wouldn't be a massive bigot
> 
> [i'm on twitter](https://twitter.com/_abbner), i post mostly FE stuff but might post future updates there
> 
> [please reblog my silly little collage for this fic on tumblr](https://abbner.tumblr.com/post/645657285396496384/you-get-what-you-settle-for-chapter-1-i-would)


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